Can a newbie give merit to high rank member? Just want also to ask who's giving merit? Any criteria for giving someone a merit?
Newbie can give sMerit to everyone, but to do that you need to have at least 1 sMerit. It means that you need to get 2 Merits from other users to receive 1 sMerit.
Who's giving merit? You can find most generous merit senders here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=merit;stats=topsendMost sMerits senders are Merit sources and others users who have lot of sMerits. But basically, every user who sMerits can send it other users.
Criteria for giving sMerits? You should merit only original, helpful, interesting quality posts